Chapter 22
THE FIRELIGHT IS almost cozy.
Almost.
Because the sight it reveals is anything but.
To the right, an obsidian cage glitters. Dark eyes stare out from it, catching the orange light.
“Min?”
Someone you care for. I was expecting Lowen or my parents. It makes sense that it would be a fae from the Underworld, though.
She nods once, a tight line between her eyebrows.
“Are you all right?”
She nods again, throat bobbing. Otherwise, she keeps still.
Opposite her cage is a large door.
The best I can tell, it’s merely a door. It isn’t in a wall, but a stone archway. I can even see by the narrow shadow spilling from it that there’s nothing behind.
I have to choose between Min’s life and getting home.
Kishel said I would find my way back but what if he was seeing a version of the future where I chose the shortcut? Is that my only hope? Even if it is, can I leave Min to her fate?
“Here she is. My new succulent—supplicant.” From one corner unfolds the bearer of the glass-shard-voice.
Bone pale. Tall. Slender. She’s almost pretty.
Red lips. Green eyes. Pale blond hair that pools around her on the floor.
“It’s been ever such a long time since I had a visitor.
” She smiles, showing off sharp teeth, and as she moves, coming closer, I see the full strange grace of her—the too-long limbs, the jutting hips, the slender fingers that end in sharpened nails.
As I circle to the left, keeping some distance between us, something cracks underfoot.
Strewn upon the ground are bones. Not animal. I’ve read enough anatomy books to recognize a femur when I see one. I’d bet these don’t belong to humans, but fae.
Suddenly I understand the structure over the fire at the center of the courtyard. A spit.
I swallow down nausea. This creature will eat Min if I don’t choose her.
And yet, my sore legs and aching joints remind me I can’t walk all the way through the labyrinth. It’s only been four days and I’m already struggling.
I need that shortcut.
But leaving Min to the monster is out of the question.
There has to be a way I can have both.
I scrape my thumbnail over the key. This creature must have a key to the cage, so she can get Min out to… eat her. If I can trick her into opening the cage. If I were to offer her another meal, perhaps.
Maybe I can trick her into freeing Min so I don’t have to use the key. I’ll reveal I’m ill—can’t risk catching something—and she won’t want to eat me, then I can use the key on the shortcut.
It’s a scrappy plan, but it’s worth a try.
“Another fae for dinner?” I sigh, shaking my head like that’s terribly boring. “Don’t you want to try human meat?”
The creature stills. Her green eyes dart over me, evaluating, curious. She licks her lips—tongue just as red.
“Free Min, and you can have me instead.” My voice wavers, like part of me understands this is a terrible idea and is trying to stop it.
She stalks closer, long legs eating up the ground with surprising speed.
“Hold on.” I raise my hands to ward her off. “You can’t eat me until Min is free.” Only then will I reveal I’m ill to put her off. She’ll be pissed off, but Min can run, and I’ll escape through the shortcut.
I back away, but her hot breath hits me with the stink of putrid flesh. Nausea roils through me, and I double over, heaving.
By the time I straighten, eyes streaming, she’s standing over me, fingers poised to grasp my arms. Her delicate nostrils quiver in excitement.
I can’t help staring at the gray piece of meat caught between her teeth. Horrified. Fascinated. Dizzy from my attempts to be sick.
Her smile as she bends closer is almost kind. I wonder if she was, once. If she had another life before the labyrinth or if she has only ever known this place, this life with a spit over a roaring fire.
Such a pretty shade of green, her eyes. So unusual.
They hold me still. I can only breathe. Wait. Surrender.
That’s what this is, I realize too late. A fae trick. One that, even though I see it, I can’t break free from.
She’s going to eat me. Then Min.
I hope I make her sick.
The quiet spell around us snaps as she gasps, recoils, crunches bone under her heel as she stumbles back. “Bad meat. That foul stuff. Here.” Her red lips spread as she gags. “No bargain,” she chokes out between retches. “I’ll keep my original meal.”
Bad meat? I’m almost offended. But relief wins as I stagger free from her magical hold and catch myself on the stone door frame of the shortcut.
Through this door, then one final challenge, then I’ll be home. To Lowen. To Annem and Pa. To our cottage and my garden. To the people who know and love me best. To my safe life where I know that when death comes for me, I won’t be alone.
The creature coughs, maybe throws up some of her awful meat.
I take my chance. I pick my way between the bones—this would be the worst time to twist my ankle—and reach Min’s cage.
She stares at me like I’ve lost my mind.
The key clicks into its hole, such a brittle sound, I’m afraid it’ll break in the lock.
Breath held, I turn the key, and as the door swings free it crumbles. Tiny fragments of glass dig into my fingertips and fall away like sand, until almost the only sign the key ever existed is the open cage door.
“A poor choice,” the woman rasps between retches. “I shouldn’t expect anything better from a human.” She spits in my direction before retreating into a dark corner of her bone-carpeted den.
Mouth hanging open, brow crumpled, Min stares at me, stricken, like she’s the one who might’ve just lost the chance to ever see her family again.
She doesn’t need to feel guilty—this was my decision. So I pull my shoulders back and give her a bright smile as I hold out my hand to help her from the cage.
“Why did you—?”
“It was an easy choice.” I’m still shrugging when she grabs my shoulders and gives me a shake.
“You really are a fool, aren’t you?”
“What? Why?” Shit. Have I fallen for a worse fae trick?
“No fae would make the choice you just did. You are…” She huffs, shaking her head. “I owe you.” She steps back, releasing my shoulders. Her eyes glisten, over bright. “Thank you.”
Then she fragments into dark dust, like the key. I reach out, but she slips through my fingers. “No.” I can’t lose her and the shortcut. That’s too cruel, even for the unseelie.
“She’s merely returned to the fortress.” The king stands on top of the wall surrounding the courtyard. Arms folded, he leans against a column marking a door leading to the next tier. He jerks his chin toward the exit, and I make my way toward it.
I rub my chest. The world spins. It might be horror or my heart. Either way, a touch of belladonna won’t hurt. With my back to him, I slip the bottle from my pocket and take a few crumbs.
By the time I open the door, a wave of warmth is rushing through me and my pulse kicks up a beat.
Ankles crossed, leaning against the opposite wall, the king is waiting on the other side.
As I sag against the door, glad to have something between me and the creature, I glare at him. “She had better be safe.”
“Of course she is. Now, anyway. I should probably thank you for saving me the trouble of finding a new royal sartor.”
Meaning that thing really would’ve eaten her. Or me.
The labyrinth is not a game. This place kills. And he has no problem with that.
His eyes narrow on me and then he gives a half smile like I’m some strange and puzzling little creature he’s found. “This is the first time I’ve seen anyone hesitate. I’ve heard of the weakness of mortal emotions, but I’ve never seen it written so plainly before. How… fascinating.”
“I’m so glad I can be a source of entertainment for you.” I hate that the belladonna makes my voice shake, so I busy myself with trying to scrape the key’s remnants off my fingers.
There’s a stubborn shard that’s worked its way into the pad of my thumb. I try to pull it out, but the jittery energy rushing through me makes my hands tremble.
A shadow passes over me, then Drystan’s fingers come around mine.
He cradles the hand that’s studded with splinters of black glass and tilts it into the light.
“I’m sure you’ll be an endless source of interest but not in the way you think,” he murmurs, voice distant as he inspects my thumb.
“Over the centuries, fae have tried to escape the Underworld. The labyrinth is the only permanent way out.” The dark slashes of his eyebrows squeeze together as he uses his nails to grip the shard that’s embedded itself in my thumb.
“This is the first time I’ve seen anyone choose their loved one over the shortcut. Why did you do that?”
As he pulls the glass out, there’s a little pain—closer to discomfort than true pain.
“I…” I shake my head. It’s impossible to explain such an obvious choice.
“You care for her.” He sets to work on another splinter I hadn’t discovered.
“Well, yes. But that isn’t why. Or at least isn’t the only reason. Even if it had been someone I didn’t care for, like Lady Phaedra, I would have chosen her.”
His eyebrows squeeze tighter as he works the splinter out. “You’d have helped her over yourself?”
I can’t help wrinkling my nose at the thought. “It wouldn’t so much be about helping Phaedra as… another person’s life is more important than my wish to go home. It’s just that caring for Min made the decision much easier than if it had been someone less… pleasant.”
He laughs softly as he checks for any more glass. “Diplomatically put. You’re getting the hang of court life.”
Blood beads on my thumb. In the cool, cloudy light, it glistens like a ruby.
Drystan’s amusement fades as he falls still. He stares at the drop of my blood.
“You are good, Annon.” His voice comes out rough, like he’s swallowed the shards of glass he’s pulled from my skin.
“Perhaps too good for this forsaken world. But that doesn’t mean I’m willing to give you up.
” His gaze skips up to mine and I’m suddenly aware of just how alone we are, of how quiet the labyrinth is and how close he is.
“I am not good and I do not care to be.”
It’s a dark promise. One that sends a strange thrill through me.
With aching slowness, he bends down, and for a second my belladonna-fueled heart thinks he’s going to kiss me.
And for some stupid reason, I don’t pull away. Even though he’s just admitted how terrible a person he is and I saw the blood-spattered evidence of that fact in the training yard with my own damn eyes.
It’s not my mouth he bends to. No, of course not—the king doesn’t kiss.
Instead, he takes my thumb to his lips and I can’t tell if it’s a nibble, a lick or a soft suck… or some combination of all those things. But it is warm and despite myself, it sends a shiver of sweet sensation through my entire body.
His grip is soft enough that I could pull away. I don’t.
When he straightens the blood is gone.
I stand there, frozen, my mouth dry, my heart hammering against my ribs like it’s trying to break out and offer itself to him on a bloody platter. There’s something intimate about knowing a piece of me, a tiny drop, is inside him, consumed, possessed, tasted.
And I’m not sure I like it.
Yet, to use his word from earlier, I can’t help finding it fascinating.
He watches me, eyes hooded, pupils so wide there’s only a thin ring of gold left around them. I lose myself in their inky blackness for an untold amount of time. His dark promise lingers there.
I am not good and I do not care to be.
What must that be like? To not care. To do as you wish. To live rather than worry about everyone else all the time. To take what you want.
A caw cuts through our shared silence.
His chest heaves on a deep inhale as though he forgot to breathe for a long while. Almost imperceptibly he leans closer. “Good luck in your journey, Annon. Though, a word for the wise—take opportunity when it comes your way. You may not get another.”
He fragments into feathers and snapping beaks, the blast of wings forcing my eyes shut.
Once the ravens disperse, I’m left staring at the staircase leading to the next level. But in my mind is etched the image of the door that would have led me to the labyrinth’s end.